There are many reasons why I didn’t write any political analysis at the time of this bloody war.

One reason is that I only wanted the war to be over, to stop the bloodshed, while I knew that the longer Gaza can stand in the face of the Israeli genocidal rampage, the better the chance that the aggressors will not get what they want and that the siege of Gaza, which, in the long term, is even more destructive to Human lives and development, will be lifted.

But the best excuse is that throughout this war the monstrous Israeli war machine seemed clumsy and clueless, while the Gaza resistance seemed to keep cool and know what they are doing.

I preferred to keep quiet and do my small thing by demonstrating against the aggression.

Now, that the war is over, what can we learn from it politically? I will try to do it short, going over many different aspects of this war, hoping to write in more details about some of them soon.

Who Won The Military Confrontation?

Great wars end with the winning side conquering territory or even with the loser signing his surrender.

The Israelis say they could conquer Gaza, but they didn’t do it. In fact, they already did it twice, in 1956 and in 1967. When they withdrew from Gaza in 2005 it was without agreement, after they paid a heavy price in two Palestinian intifadas. The fact that Gaza was not occupied again is the combine result of the expected resistance to the act of occupation and the memories of the resistance over 38 years of continued occupation. Any way you count it, the resistance is what keeps Gaza free of direct occupation.

Without gaining land or surrender, isn’t war all about killing people and destructing their livelihood? The Israeli officers, politicians and experts run to the judge of history crying: “We killed more than 2,000 people; we destroyed the homes of almost half a million Gazans, what they did to us is nothing to compare. You must declare us winners!”

But this is not the way the war is decided. We live in the world of expectations. Everybody knew that Israel has the military firepower to destroy Gaza. If the war is not for total annihilation of the other side, then it is fought to prove something about the relationship of forces.

Like Lebanon’s Hezbollah in summer 2006, the Palestinian resistance in summer 2014, led by the Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, surprised Israel both with their technical preparations and with their fighting power.

Missiles and mortars – The previous Israeli onslaught on Gaza, just in November 2012, ended with a few rockets that reached the Tel-Aviv metropolitan area, where most of the Israelis live. Now, for the first time, Tel Aviv was systematically targeted, putting in doubt the Israeli assumption that it can wage its wars on other people’s lands without being targeted. From the first days of the confrontation, as they had no effective way to stop the rockets flying, the Israeli military commanders claimed that the resistance is running out of ammunition. By the end of the first week they declared that a third of the missiles were already used. After 51 days of war the only possible conclusion is that they didn’t have any idea how many rockets there were. The only bright side for the Israelis was the development of the anti-rocket systems, which limited the practical damage they suffered. It is still an open question how much of this is real technological success and how much is the weakness of the new Palestinian rockets. Yet, you should remember that many of the people in Gaza that were launching these rockets spent their summers as kids throwing stones at Israeli soldiers. They have many reasons to feel that they are making progress.

The Tunnels – In this war the Palestinian resistance gave a new dimension to the old notion of Underground movement. It compensated for the overwhelming Israeli firepower and Israel’s full control of the air and the sea with this simple, old technological solution. The tunnels that went under the fence and behind Israeli lines where only a small addition. The Israeli fixation with “destroying the tunnels” (whether real or simulated) enabled the resistance to kill many more soldiers inside Gaza than those killed by attacks through the tunnels.

Endurance – Israel was not prepared for a long confrontation. In the end it was the longest war of its kind. Typically the Israeli political thinking was that they should buy as much as possible political time in order to let the army do its thing (They call it “Let the IDF win” – even though they don’t even remember when they last won, nor have any idea what such a win should be…) On the other side the Hamas leadership made an up-hill job during the long days of fighting and negotiations to improve the functioning of the new Palestinian unity and heal some of the breaches in the Arab solidarity. In the end news of rockets in Tel Aviv fell on the Western news somewhere between car bombs in Baghdad and an earthquake in Iceland – not a ranking that the Zionist state, as the spoiled child of the world’s top powers, can let themselves be in.

For all these reasons, this military confrontation created some shift in the completely imbalanced balance of power in favor of the Palestinians.

The Politics of the War

The military confrontation is just the tip of the iceberg of a much wider confrontation between political entities, societies and economies. Each side in our days is deeply dependant on a supportive “camp” of states, people and cultures.

Israel started this war at what seemed like an optimal combination of political circumstances. The suffering of the Palestinian people tends be shadowed by the bloody mayhem in Syria, Iraq, Libya and other Arab countries. The Western powers have lost any purpose or semblance of direction in handling the conflict in Palestine and their attitude is defined by their prejudice against Palestinians as “terrorists” and by the mantra about “Israel’s right to defend itself”, no matter what any of the two sides is doing.

The Palestinian resistance entered this war in the worst regional conditions. It has never been more isolated. The Egyptian state is now controlled by a boiling counter-revolution that regards Hamas as an extension of its main enemy, the Muslim Brothers. The traditional supporters of the resistance in Iran and Syria are busy putting down the insurrection by the Syrian people and didn’t forget Hamas’ taking sides with the revolt against Bashar. So the resistance in Gaza was left with only Qatar and Turkey as active political backers for its aspiration to break the siege.

In these conditions, developments throughout the war didn’t bring any massive breakthrough but did help gradually to tilt the edge toward the resistance’s side.

In the beginning of the war Israel was exited by its own unity around the sacred cause. This wall to wall unity is typical to the settlers’ community in Israel at the beginning of any war and is held together by complete disregard to the Palestinians as Human beings and by the long practiced rituals of self-victimization. But recent developments in the Israeli society meant that racist extremism, the logical conclusion of the settler mentality, took control of politics, the street and the media. Before the end of the war most of the ruling coalition and half of the war cabinet turned to “talkback attacks” on the government and the military leadership for failing to satisfy their militarist dreams. The atmosphere of internal terror against any opposition to the war helped to silence political opponents but didn’t make the “internal front” much stronger.

On the other side the Palestinians entered this war with a newly established “unity government” that started its period by the PA President Abbas declaring that security cooperation with the occupation is “sacred” and failing to transfer wages to tens of thousands of government employees in Gaza. The Israelis hoped to use Abbas to add pressure on the Hamas-led resistance in Gaza.

As the attack on Gaza enraged Palestinians elsewhere, there was a massive popular mobilization – most significantly in Al-Quds, where there was a local Intifada after the burning to death of Muhammad Abu Khdeir. In the 1948-occupied territories Palestinian youth held the widest confrontations with the police since October 2000, in which more than a thousand were detained. In the West Bank there were several mass demonstrations and several demonstrators were shot dead by the Israeli army.

In the end it was the Palestinians that played the unity card, succeeded to form a united list of Palestinian demands and a united negotiating team. Israeli and Egyptian “achievements” like letting Abbas’ men control the border crossings are no more than face saving for them to cover their agreement to relieve the siege. What extra “security” for them will the Palestinian guards give as anything that goes through the crossings is already scrutinized by the Israelis or the Egyptians?

On the Arab level Hamas made the best in the worst conditions. For some time the Palestinian cause was again at the center of attention. There were demonstrations in many places, massive ones in Jordan, some even in Haleb (Allepo) in spite of continuous bombing by the regime. In these conditions every Arab government felt obliged to pay some lips’ service to show support for the Palestinians. Even the Egyptian government had to temper down its instinctive hostility.

Throughout the world there was a wave of activity and support for the Palestinian cause. Naturally “Stop the War” was accompanied by “Lift the Siege”, “BDS” and “Free Palestine”. The Latin American left, which took control of most of the state in South America over the last decade, gave important moral support, led by Evo Morales, Bolivia’s first Indian and Socialist president, who endorsed BDS and declared Israel a terrorist state.

Public opinion in the Arab World and the West also forced some rethinking in the ruling imperialist circles. It mostly came in two waves: First the temporary suspension of air travel to Tel Aviv, later re-examination of some weapons’ supply by the US, Britain and Spain. This doesn’t mean that the Western powers overcame their racist instinct – we have seen, for example, the European initiative toward the end of the war to re-condition the lifting of the siege of Gaza on its demilitarization – just as the Israelis themselves all but dropped this condition. But Israel is not as high as it used to be in the imperialist agenda – it is just another source of problems. Its imperialist masters have almost forgotten when was the last time that it served their interests in any effective way.

What Next?

The future of Gaza is still uncertain. Even when you reach agreement with Israel (or with Egypt) there is no guarantee that it will be honored, as happened with the agreements after the previous (2012) war and with the 2011 prisoners’ exchange. Yet Gaza is fighting for liberty…

It required one intifada to bring in the PLO and another intifada to throw away the Israeli army and settlers. The Israeli withdrawal in 2005 enabled the relatively free 2006 elections and the establishment of the Hamas government. By 2007 Hamas succeeded to implement the elections result and take full control after aborting an attempted coup by a US trained militia led by Dahlan.

Gaza became the first (and till now only) part of Palestine under Palestinian control. Since then Israel makes everything it can to make this experience at Palestinian independence painful. In the last years its official policy is “differentiation” – to prove that lives under the occupation and Abbas in the West Bank is better than independence (and siege) under Hamas. Being loath to give anything to the Palestinians and driven by uncontrollable desire for settlements and land grab, it concentrated its effort on making life in Gaza a hell.

Gaza became stronger in spite of the siege and consecutive attacks. In the last war, for the first time, Gaza fought like a state, mostly by organized armed forces under central command. In the middle of the war Hamas’ leader, Khaled Mashaal, boasted that the resistance is killing soldiers while the Israelis are killing civilians. By the end of the war most Palestinian leaders agreed that the guarantee for their achievements is not any agreement but the power of the resistance.

But the struggle is not about Gaza – it is about the future of Palestine. And Palestine could not be freed while much of the rest of the Arab world is deteriorating into a bloody civil war. The heroic standing of the Palestinian during the latest assault on Gaza was an important reminder to the Arab people everywhere that the fight for freedom requires unity in the face of the oppressors and that it can be won even at the harshest conditions.

On Saturday, April 12, “Adalah” – the most respected Human Rights NGO in Haifa – published “breaking news” about the detention of political and media activist, journalist Majd Kayyal, who happened to be also the editor of Adalah’s internet site. Majd was arrested at a border crossing from Jordan called “Sheikh Hussein” on the Jordan River, immediately on his arrival to the Israeli checkpoint. He was on his way back from Beirut, where he participated in a public conference held on the occasion of 40 years of the newspaper “Al-Safir”, in which he regularly publishes articles.

Adalah reported that its lawyer tried to meet Majd in detention, but the police didn’t allow this, claiming that there is an order prohibiting Majd from meeting lawyers. Adalah further noted in its statement that its lawyers will represent Majd on the next day, Sunday, 13.4, in hearings of the police request to remand the detention.

Adalah’s short message about Majd’s detention ends with an optimistic note promising further details…

According to foreign sources…

Since the initial announcement of Majd’s detention, Adalah didn’t publish any further details.

Instead, we read on their site general discussions concerning the law that forbids Israeli citizens from visiting “enemy countries” and the law that allows the authorities to prevent a detainee meeting his lawyers. No names, no details, no Majd. Yesterday he was detained and today he disappeared, as if he never existed.

You could think that Majd was released… After all, hundreds of people are arrested every day for little or no reason by the Israeli police and most of them are released without anyone writing a word.

Searching the net for Majd Kayyal in Hebrew brings very little fresh news. A site called “KafeHafukh” (White Coffee) reported (Tuesday 15.4) that in the routine briefing at the US State Department, the speaker Ms. Psaki expressed concern about reports on the arrest of journalist Majd Kayyal. She added: “We have seen the reports… that he’s being held incommunicado detention, but we have not been able to confirm these reports. We’re continuing to seek more information”.

If the State Department can’t determine the facts despite their “concern” – how would we discover what happened to Majd?

The couple of magic buttons leads us to search in English for “Majd Kayyal” and we can easily find Ali Abunimah’s report in “Electronic Intifada”. It says that the Haifa Court extended Majd’s detention from Sunday, 13.4, until next Tuesday, 22.4. Electronic Intifada even publishes a protocol of the court’s hearing in Hebrew and English. From this protocol we learn that the court prevented any publication about the proceedings against Majd and that Majd is still prevented from meeting his lawyers.

We also learn that the judge who extended the detention and ordered the “disappearance” of Majd is Zayed Falah, a former military prosecutor.

About Majd

To be honest with my readers, I must clarify that I know personally Majd Kayyal as a neighbor and a family friend ever since he came to this world some 23 years ago…

He is the son of prominent proud Palestinians activists from Haifa.

The Kayyal family was displaced from their ancestors’ village of Birwa when it was occupied and destroyed in 1948. Birwa is well known as the birthplace of Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish. On its ruins was established the Zionist settlement of “Akhihud”, while the original inhabitants are forbidden from returning to their lands.

Majd’s cousin, Asil ‘Asli, was killed by the Israeli police in the second Intifada demonstrations in October 2000 in the Galilee village of Arabeh. He was one of the 13 Arab demonstrators murdered in the territories occupied by Israel since 1948 at the first days of the Intifada. Their killing symbolizes for many the unity of fate of the Palestinians in their struggle against Zionist occupation and apartheid.

Majd grew into political activity and we often met in many demonstrations: On Land Day, in the days commemorating the events of October 2000, in protests against the demolition of homes and land confiscation, in solidarity activities with Palestinian prisoners.

In the commemoration of the Nakba on May 15, 2011, we were detained together in a demonstration in Bir’am forest, just in front of the village of Maroun Ar-Ras on the other side of the Lebanese border, where a peaceful “March of Return” of Palestinian refugees from Lebanon met with murderous fire of the Israeli army.

Majd was arrested in November 2011 with the crew of the ship “Tahrir”, which was on its way to Gaza with humanitarian supplies as part of the campaign to break the siege.

Majd is an example of the new generation of young Palestinian activists, sharing his time between Internet activities on more traditional ones in the streets. He finds time for creative writing and journalism, the struggle for human rights and the struggle for national and social liberation.

He was among the activists who organized the opposition to the “Prawer plan” for ethnic cleansing of tens of thousands of Bedouin from the Naqab (Negev) and the destruction of dozens of villages. When news came of the cancellation of that plan (at least temporarily) I saw him full of happiness and satisfaction.

No wonder the police and Shabak (GSS) are looking for an opportunity to shut up Majd. His mother, Suhair Badarne, told us that in one recent “interview” with the Shabak in Haifa the interrogator warned her they were planning to frame Majd and have him imprisoned for a long period.

The Forces of Darkness

The evil forces prefer to operate in the dark. Majd is held now, as far as we know, in the damp and dark cellars of the “GSS Division” at the Jalameh detention center (“Kishon”), isolated from the outside world. The steamroller of repressive mechanisms is applied upon him in order to force him to confess of crimes he did not commit.

It’s the only reasonable explanation for preventing him from meeting his lawyers, for the prevention of even eye contact with his family during the remand proceedings, for the sweeping publication ban on details of the proceedings against him (all according to foreign sources, of course).

If the investigation was about the offense of entering an “enemy country” – it could be held in the open and wouldn’t even require detention, as Majd traveled openly to Lebanon to attend a public event. He also reported himself on his experiences in Beirut, among other places in a post (in Arabic, of course) on “Jadaliyya”.

Many Israeli journalists visited all “enemy countries” and reported their trips without being arrested or punished. If Majd Kayyal is detained and persecuted because of his trip to Lebanon – the problem is not of Lebanon being an “enemy country” but the attitude of the State of Israel regarding all the Palestinian people in the country as enemies.

The total blackout imposed on Majd would not be possible were it not for the indifference, consent and naturalness with which Israeli public opinion accepts the denial of basic human rights of any Arab, just for being an Arab. A journalist, a human rights activist, a political activist is detained for a prolonged period while GAG is imposed and he is denied meeting his lawyers. These are draconian measures that make mock of the thin veneer of proclaimed democracy.

The Forces of Light

A group of Anarchists named “Unity” called for a demonstration on Wednesday (16.4) morning in front of the offices of “Haaretz” newspaper in Tel Aviv to protest the non-publication of the affair and attract media attention to it. They planned to shift the vigil later in front of police and Shabak offices nearby, to demand the immediate release of Majd and cessation of political persecution against him and against the Palestinians in general.

Majd’s friends are planning a demonstration on Thursday, 17.4, at 19:30, in “Prisoner’s Square”, Carmel Avenue (Ben Gurion) near the Haddad hotel in the German Colony in Haifa. Another demonstration is planned outside the courthouse in case the police will apply for remand on Tuesday (22.4) morning.

Public struggle can at least remove the veil of secrecy over human rights violations against Majd Kayyal. Help us in this struggle.

Hot News

(Wednesday 16.4, 18:00) Under the pressure of protest and publications here and abroad, the police informed Adalah that the GAG order over Majd’s detention will be removed tomorrow (Thursday, 17.4) at 12:00.

You may freely write and demonstrate about the case, demand Majd’s release and protest the fact that he is prevented from meeting his lawyers!

Good News

(Thursday 17.4, morning) The public pressure helped – Thanks to all of you who took part in lifting the veil of darkness by protesting and publishing! This night Adalah lawyers were at last allowed to meet Majd Kayyal.

Now we demand Majd’s immediate release. See you in the demo today at 19:30 in the German Colony, Haifa.

Even Better News

(Thursday 17.4, 17:30) Majd was released from the Jelemeh detention center and is now under house detention…

Thanks again to everybody that published and protested!

There was no legal justification for Majd’s detention in the first place – and it couldn’t stand even 5 hours of public scrutiny.

We return from the demonstration in Ramiya against Apartheid in the Galilee and talk about the struggle against the Prawer Plan for dispossessing the Arabs of the Naqab (Negev). Confusion reigns … Did we win or not? Was the Prawer Plan really stopped or does the government still intend to raise it again? In any case it is clear that the fight is not over. Discrimination, destruction and dispossession are the characteristics of “the system” all across the country, from the river to the sea. With increasing self-confidence of the young activists the struggle will go on and escalate.

Are we ready for the struggle ahead? Did we learn the lessons from previous struggles and recent events?

One essential issue in every struggle is the defense of the detainees. On the last “Day of Rage” (30/11/2013) against the Prawer Plan, in the demonstrations in Hora and in Haifa, it seemed that it was mostly the police that unleashed unbridled rage at the demonstrators. Demonstrators who were arrested were brutally beaten systematically after their arrest and beating continued even in the police stations. Contempt for the law by the police is reaching new heights when a prisoner begs to stop hitting him and the cop advises him to “complain to Mahash” and continues to beat him. (“Mahash” is the department responsible for investigations of complaints against policemen, and is famous for closing cases without any investigation.) We still have a lot to do even just to make the police try to pretend to respect the law.

In any case we can learn a lot from the experience of the recent detentions…

Why was Eldad Zion Arrested?

One of the detainees in the Hora demonstration was a teacher from Tel Aviv named Eldad Zion. Even according to the police Eldad was not involved in any violent activity during the demonstration. He was detained because he tried to talk to the police and convince them not to beat other detainees.

The primary offense that was attributed to Eldad by the police in the Be’er Sheva court occurred at the police station called “The Townships Station”, to which he was taken with other detainees from the demonstration. Eldad’s description of the event is presented by Or Kashti in “Haaretz” in the following words: “I entered the detainees’ room, whose walls are adorned with handwritten ‘Kahane was right’ and ‘Moses commanded to kill all the Arabs’, with the symbols of the Border’s Guard police unit. I saw a policeman slapping a detainee, so I raised my voice. In response 2-3 policemen attacked me from behind, took me out of the room, kicked me and broke the glasses… I did my civic duty while confronted by police violence. The police must be supervised by civilians. We must remain vigilant.”

On the other hand, the police accusations against Eldad, designed to justify the assault, amounted to claiming that “he grabbed a policeman’s shirt and pushed another officer.” On this flimsy base the prosecution tried consistently to build an image of Eldad as a dangerous person, as Kashti reported from the court: “This is a dangerous man,” said prosecution attorney Guy Zehavi yesterday, “the first rule of release on bail is confidence. Here is someone that has no fear of the law and goes against the law – assaults and disrupts.” Mr. Zehavi objected to the claim that Zion is not dangerous because the Prawer Plan was canceled. “First, the program is not canceled, and secondly – it’s like one who killed his wife and now claims not to be dangerous any longer because his wife already died.”

Eldad was kept in detention due to these accusations for two and a half weeks. The police even sought remand until the end of proceedings. Finally, the court decided to release him to house arrest under “24 hours guard” by his friends who volunteered to guarantee his release. Just yesterday (24.12) Eldad was finally released from house arrest under severe restrictive conditions.

Eldad himself, being such a good soul, after being beaten by the police, declared that he forgives them for all that they did. He reiterated this position even after his release and expanded his forgiveness to include the prosecution that insisted on remand and the judges which extended his detention for no reason again and again.

We’re talking about Eldad and try to understand his position – is it naivety or greatness? Is it possible that this position has led to further harassment against him? Here are some historical precedents.

Memories from the Intifada

Muhannad tells us about a friend from the days of the Stones’ Intifada (1987-1995), who was active in “The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine” and participated in many clashes against the occupation soldiers. He was arrested many times, interrogated and tortured. He was sentenced and spent a period in Israeli prisons.

After he served his sentence and the Intifada ended, our friend finished his undergraduate studies and earned a scholarship to graduate school in the United States. He applied for permission to study through the Palestinian “Liaison Committees”, but all his appeals were rejected.

In his repeated appeals to the Palestinian liaison officer our friend begged him:

– “Tell them, the Israelis, that I’m not vindictive. I forgive them for everything they did to me.”

– “You see,” replied the liaison officer, “precisely because of this attitude you will never get a travel permit. Because you see yourself in a position where you can forgive the Israelis! They will never forgive you for that…”

Dangerous Historical Precedent

Finally Iris summarizes the discussion.

Eldad was lucky to be released to house arrest. He got off cheaply. The person that preceded him and thought he could forgive everybody finished on the cross.

Karmiel was born in sin – it was a cornerstone of the “Judaization of the Galilee” racist colonialist project. It was built on large areas of land that were confiscated from nearby Arab towns and villages. This confiscation was not for development for “public purposes” – as claimed by the Israeli government’s confiscation orders – but in order to uproot the residents of the area, concentrate them in ghettos of poverty and settle in their place another public – exclusively those adhering to the Jewish religion.

Galilee Apartheid reality, represented by Karmiel, Misgav “communal” settlements, Nazareth Illit and their likes, does not end with the expropriation of land and its allocation according to racial criteria. Judaization is a comprehensive policy encompassing all aspects of life: discrimination in building infrastructure and providing services to residents; endless obstacles obstructing residential construction in Arab communities while encouraging Jewish settlement; blocking economic development in the Arab ghettos versus benefits and incentives to enterprises in the Apartheid towns.

Ahab and Naboth’s vineyard in Karmiel

The most outrageous illustration of Karmiel’s character as Apartheid City is the fate of the residents Ramiya, who live on their own land, which was lawfully registered in the Land Registry Office, long before the establishment of Karmiel.

When Ahab of Karmiel desired the vineyard of Naboth and his land, he was ready to use any means to get them.

Usually the legal excuse against unrecognized Arab villages, built on their private lands, is that they are built on agricultural land and therefore no building can be legalized there – even if it is an old building, standing there before the planning law itself. (For building Jewish settlements, of course, the designated usage of land is easily altered). But Ramiya’s lands are in the midst of Karmiel’s building areas. Why not recognize Ramiya’s houses as a separate village or as part of the city? The answer is obvious: because the city was founded for Jews – and Arabs should be evacuated.

A sweeping confiscation order against Ramiya’s lands was issued already in 1976 – on the grounds of “public needs” – at the height of the “Judaization of the Galilee” drive. After a long legal battle Israel’s “Supreme” Court upheld the expropriation on March 1, 1992.

But the abuse of Ramiya’s residents didn’t stop at the expropriation itself. In order to force the residents to give up their houses and lands, Karmiel’s Municipality and various state agencies wage a deliberate policy of siege and deprivation of basic needs against Ramiya’s residents, which can’t but remind us of the siege of Gaza.

One example that cries out to heaven is preventing Ramiya’s houses from connecting to the electricity grid. When residents bought generators, (who learns by candlelight these days?) the “good neighbors” complained about the generators’ noise. Instead of providing electricity to the residents, Karmiel’s Municipality sent inspectors to demand the shutdown of the generators at night and left Ramiya’s residents in the cold and dark.

Struggle and Agreement

In the early 1990s Ramiya became the center of the struggle against the Judaization of the Galilee. On one opportunity the central Land Day demonstration was held in Ramiya. Later there was a mass march from Majd al-Kurum to Ramiya.

Public pressure forced the Israel Lands Administration to agree to negotiations and finally reach a compromise, which was signed as an agreement with the residents in 1995.

The agreement, as signed, is far from doing justice. According to it the village will be destroyed and with it the existing fabric of life. The residents succumb to the racist expropriation forced upon them. It allows the state to take over the lands of Ramiya for a compensation that is a small fraction of their market value.

However, the agreement, to some extent, breaks the principle of Apartheid around which Karmiel was founded by enabling Ramiya residents to stay in the area and build their homes. To this end the Administration undertook to provide 30 building plots in a special neighborhood that will be built in Karmiel.

The agreement also included the provision of compensation to Ramiya residents in the form of 15 building plots and some farmland outside of Karmiel.

The Zionist Principle: More Land, Fewer Arabs

The Israel Lands Administration, which hurried before the agreement to try forcibly evict the residents, was in no hurry to fulfill the agreement. More than five years passed before it allocated the proposed land for resettlement of Ramiya’s residents in a new neighborhood of Karmiel.

The residents also were in no hurry to give up their homes and lands with which their lives’ stories were entwined.

Finally, between 2001 and 2003, the Administration began implementing the agreement in its own way: Take control of as much land as it can and allow as few Arabs as possible to remain in Karmiel. It signed an agreement for the evacuation of two families that possessed more land but had a smaller number of inhabitants and gave them about 35% of the land intended for the construction of the new neighborhood (which had shrunk meanwhile from 30 to 29 plots).

The Administration informed all other residents that they must make do with what was left. By doing so the administration is trying to force a reality which clearly does not maintain the minimum that was to be guaranteed by the settlement agreement – enabling Ramiya residents persist as a community and build their lives in their village.

The Shifting Sands of the Law

At this stage a legal miracle occurred for the residents of Ramiya.

Some residents had filed a lawsuit against the administration in the Haifa District Court, arguing that the administration had violated the settlement agreement. The ruling, issued by Judge Raniel on November 24, 2009 (civil case 699/07), confirms the claims of the plaintiffs that the Administration violated the agreement. Beyond that, the ruling states that “compliance with the agreement as it is, at the current state of affairs as of today, is not possible, given the unequal distribution carried out by the Administration. In this situation the agreement should be applied approximately. The administration should make adjustments in order to correct the distortion and inequality that were created and that the administration acknowledged their existence, by adding on the plots quotas agreed upon.”

Would you expect the Administration to rush to comply with the verdict and allow all Ramiya residents to build their homes in Karmiel? Not in Israel. We have seen it in many cases in the past, most famously in the case of displaced villagers of Bir’am, Iqrit and Ghabsiyah, where the Supreme Court issued orders allowing them to return to their lands. Even if “by mistake” an Israeli court issues a ruling recognizing some rights of Arab citizens, it is nothing but an unfortunate mistake to be fixed by another judicial ruling or directly in practice by the authorities.

In our case, the Administration made the petitioners who won their case to join other judicial proceeding dealing with the cases of other Ramiya residents, which was held in the same Haifa District Court. In this proceeding (civil case 35576/12/10), the Administration found a sympathetic ear in the form of judge Lamshtreich–Leter, which justified all the claims of the Administration, embraced all claims against the residents and even invented new arguments on her own behalf. In her judgment issued on August 5, 2013, contrary to custom, the judge ignored the previous verdict of judge Raniel issued at the very same court, and turned his ruling upside down.

Judge Lamshtreich–Leter was not content “only” to justify the theft of lands belonging to Ramiya residents and to order their deportation from Karmiel. She went farther and put forward her own militant agenda, ruling that any of the residents who would not sign an evacuation agreement with the Administration within 90 days (until November 4, 2013) shall be deemed to renounce voluntarily his rights within the framework of the 1995 settlement agreement and would have to evacuate the area immediately.

The residents filed an appeal against this draconian ruling in the Supreme Court (Civil Appeal 7198/13). The hearing of the appeal on its merits was not yet been held, but Judge Barak-Erez, in her decision of November 11, 2013, refused to grant suspension of execution of the evacuation until the hearing of the appeal and required the petitioners to pay the costs.

Divide and Rob

The most disgusting aspect of the authorities’ conduct in this context is their systematic efforts in sowing discord between Ramiya residents.

The method is simple: The Administration announced that the 30 plots allotted to the new neighborhood in Karmiel are the last offer for Ramiya’s people and that if any of the residents had no place to live this is an internal problem of the division between the residents.

Thus we see, unfortunately, some lawsuits by Ramiya residents against other residents.

When judge Raniel ordered the Administration to allocate additional plots, the Administration completely ignored this directive.

On the other hand, judge Lamshtreich–Leter, in her ruling, adopts this quarrel-mongering tactic wholeheartedly and finds for it new justifications out of any context.

But the arbitrary and scandalous judgment, which denies the achievements of the residents in the agreement of 1995 and ordered their immediate evacuation without housing solutions, finally re-united the residents and re-ignited the public struggle over the principled issues, against racist evictions and land grab.

No to Apartheid – Yes to all Ramiya residents’ right to live in Karmiel

After decades of suffering and persecution, the drama in Ramiya is approaching the moment of truth.

Will forced evictions take place? Is the city of Karmiel determined to solidify its position as Apartheid City through a celebration of destruction and violence?

Or perhaps there is another way, allowing Ramiya residents at least to build homes in the neighborhood assigned for them in Karmiel? We repeat and mention that it is much less than justice – but definitely a crack in the walls of Apartheid…

Let us not forget that the struggle against dispossession and evictions in Ramiya takes place concurrently with the struggle against the “Prawer Plan” for ethnic cleansing against the Naqab (Negev) Bedouin and their concentration in ghettos, as well as similar dispossession and deportation programs in South Mount Hebron, the Jordan Valley and other areas. The guiding principle in all these cases and many others all over Palestine is the dispossession of the indigenous people on a racial basis, the theft of their lands and its re-allocation for the benefit of Apartheid Settlements.

You can help us in the struggle to stop Apartheid.

What can you do?

· Join the demonstration on Friday, December 20

The Follow-up Committee of the Arab population calls for a demonstration against the eviction of Ramiya and for the right of all Ramiya residents to live on their land, as an independent village or as residents of Karmiel.

The demonstration will take place on Friday, December 20, 2013. Gathering will be at 13:30 in front of the Municipality of Karmiel and from there we will march to Ramiya.

If you can’t come that far you may organize a parallel vigil elsewhere and let us know.

· Share information

· Send letters

You can start by sending the attached protest letter (or anything you like to write) to the Israel Lands Authority, which is responsible for the racist policy against Ramiya’s residents, through its site:

It is common knowledge that the police are taught the art of “dry beating” – causing a lot of pain but not leaving clear marks to show in court. Well, today’s police apparently lost this fine art. 21 demonstrators who were arrested on Saturday in the “Day of Rage” demonstration in the German Colony in Haifa downtown were brought to the court yesterday (Sunday 1/12/2013) for remand. Many of them did not have to raise a shirt or roll up their pants’ sleeves to show the judge their bruises – signs of trauma and blood were easily seen on their faces.

Sabrin Diab, a young woman from Tamra in the Galilee, appeared at court with a broken arm fixed in plaster (in the picture, last on the left in the rear) – as a result of the beating she had taken at the time of her arrest. When the lawyers of some other detainees asked the police representative in court “Did he receive medical treatment?” the answer was uniform and laconic: “whoever asked for medical treatment received it.” One after the other the detainees stood up and testified about beatings and pains – and the refusal of the Haifa police and the guards at the Jalameh detention center (“Kishon”) to allow them to see a doctor or receive treatment.

Police Escalation – Also in Court

In the last days the Israeli media was full with incitement by the heads of the racist Zionist establishment against the demonstrators protesting the “Prawer Plan”. Netanyahu’s call to “prosecute them to the end” was not lost on the Haifa police. The police chose to request remand for 21 of the demonstrators that were detained in Haifa, two of them minors. When the hearing judge decided this morning to release the two minors and send them to house arrest, the police rushed to ask for a stay of execution and appealed.

The hearing on extending the detention of the 19 other detainees – four of them women – was conducted in 3 different sessions due to the difficulty to accommodate all the detainees in the courtroom. But the police in its remand request collected all the charges in one package against all of them. To raise the severity of the accusations they resorted to articles of the law that are rarely used in such cases. All 19 detainees were accused of “assaulting a police officer with firearms or cold weapons” and of “causing severe injury when the offender is carrying a weapon.”

Fortunately the enthusiasm and wild exaggeration did not serve the police well this time. The police representative tried to describe the situation as if the German Colony’s streets were full of stones being thrown and told about many policemen that were injured and needed treatment. When asked to provide details he could not name even one policeman who was injured and could not provide any medical certificates.

When the police prosecutor was requested to elaborate how were the “suspects” armed and asked whether any weapons were sized he claimed that they were armed with stones, which were naturally thrown and therefore not caught with the protesters. When asked what was the role of each of the suspects he responded only that “the evidence is before the court.” In some cases the judge volunteered to review the material and answered instead of the policeman – and in all those cases it appeared that the suspects were charged in their initial interrogation only with “assaulting police officers” and all the issue of stone-throwing (or any other “weapons”) was not even mentioned.

Beating in the Advanced Command Post

From what the detainees told in court we learned that they were beaten hardest after their violent arrest. The police established a forward command center in a municipal building on Radak Street near Carmel Boulevard (“Ben Gurion”). The cops were leading the detainees to this center where they could beat them freely away from the media and the public.

One detainee told how a policeman held him down by pressing his knee (the cop’s) on his neck while punching fists in his face. The signs of the knee and punches were easy to identify.

Alleged Ground for Remand

Cases where protesters are detained typically follow a fixed pattern: the cops complain that they were victims of assault and they are also the witnesses. This format has one advantage: because it is assumed that the detainees can’t influence the police witnesses, it is difficult to use the grounds of “fear of obstruction of justice” to justify prolonged detention. This time the police tried to justify a prolonged detention by claiming that they intend to interrogate many people who were present, not only police officers…

The police prosecutor, who recently enjoyed high unconditional confidence from the Haifa Court in various political detention cases, refused to answer most questions. He even refused to answer some question routinely repeated in remand hearings as “how many investigation acts the police intends to conduct?” (The only answer given to this question was “a lot”). When he was asked questions about various details in the case he often avoided any answer and kept himself busy with the mobile phone in his hand. At one point, he even ostentatiously turned his back to the lawyer who was questioning him. When that attorney protested he said: “I hear you this way just the same.”

The detainees complained that they were denied food and drink all the way at the Haifa police station, in prison and while in detention in court. One of the lawyers even asked whether starving the detainees is part of the many “investigation acts” taken by the police in this case.

The fight against the Prawer Plan continues in court

Many representatives of the media attended the court hearing. There is no doubt that the “Day of Rage” protest on Saturday brought a quantum leap in public awareness to the Prawer plan to dispossess the Arabs of the Naqab (Negev in Hebrew) and the resistance it evokes.

It is common practice that, while the detainees are brought into the court, reporters and photographers get a “time out” to take pictures and interview them. These are often difficult and embarrassing moments for detainees. This time the detainees entered holding their heads high and happy for the opportunity to speak out – obviously proud to take part in the just struggle against ethnic cleansing. They rushed to make statements to the media about the objectives of the struggle. Some of the detainees raised their hands with the victory sign upon entering the hall.

Many of the defense lawyers explained and stressed in court that this is a legitimate, just and even indispensable struggle of the Arab population against the injustice done by the state. Some lawyers even mentioned that they themselves participated in the demonstration.

Release, appeal and postponement

Meanwhile the appeal hearing about the release of the two minor detainees was held in the district court. Under pressure from the court, the parties agreed on postponing the release until 8 pm.

After long proceedings that filled most of the time from 9:30 am to 17:00 pm, the judge decided to release the rest of the detainees. The prosecution announced that it plans to appeal. Six detainees, including Sabrin Diab with the broken arm and lawyer Suhair Assad were released anyway. Release of the rest, two women and eleven men, was postponed until the appeal hearing on Monday.

* * *

Today (Monday, December 2) at 14:30 the Haifa District Court decided to dismiss the prosecution’s appeal and release all the detainees – some of them under house arrest.

(This call for a demonstration in Haifa was published on Facebook on behalf of several Palestinian activists from the Patriotic Youth… The demonstration had to take place on Sunday, August 25, 2013. More than 120 activists expressed their desire to participate. The invitation was later deleted for reasons that were not yet specified…)

From politics to ethics

The crimes committed against our peoples in Syria and Egypt, and the justifications of these crimes by different official bodies, were they Arab or foreign, are an additional confirmation that we are beyond the stage of political debate. There is no place for political positions or activity unless it is within the framework of the principled defense of morality. This morality is represented by the basic Human Rights of the Arab citizen wherever he is, the right of the Arab person to live in dignity and to exercise his fundamental rights to demonstrate, hold sit-in or resist any official decision through peaceful means, which are legitimate morally and according to international conventions.

The military’s intervention in politics

The image reflected from our Arab region shows that the military is the master of the scene in Syria and Egypt. The army comes to politics under the pretext of security and then kills the citizen in the name of ideology. It only attempts to silence and kill innocent people so that all justifications for murder will be present, whatever the size of the crime and whatever the means. This way the clearing of a peaceful sit-in or spraying children with chemical weapons become a maneuver aimed first and foremost to eliminate the sacred status of the human being, whose dignity and rights constitute the first origin of real national security and real democratic transformation.

The sanctity of the holy sites

We also call upon all those who are interested in the unity of our societies for a better future, to stand firmly against any attempt at burning or desecration of any of the holy sites. Do not enter the language of fitna (sectarian division) to peoples’ minds, whether fuelling it with the pretext of refusing it, or strengthening it in order to gain advantage.

Finally, because the progress of our societies requires a moral compass, which is the first and last origin for any position about any political event, and because silence is the neutrality that complements the crime, we invite you to participate in the demonstration and to light candles…

Some days ago the Palestinian flag was raised on the old clock tower in Akka (Acre). Tomorrow the Arch-fascist Marzel is planning to make a provocative visit to the Arab city, and under the guard of Israeli “security” forces call for the expulsion of the Arab residents of this old Arab city. The people of Akka are preparing for confrontation, saying they will not let Marzel spread his poisonous propaganda in their city. In between, they found the time today (19/11/2012) to demonstrate in support of their brothers and sisters which are being massacred in Gaza.
The Ghassan Kanafani youth movement is one of the nicest flowers of the Arab Spring to flourish in the 48-occupied Palestine. Less than a year ago the group was formed by local youth as a response to the failure of the local parties to do enough in solidarity with the Prisoner’s strike. Today they already initiated a demonstration that was joined by all the local Arab parties. The location was also symbolic – the old “Canon’s Circle” which they renamed Ghassan Kanafani’s Circle.
The new highway from Haifa to Akka, though not yet finished, allowed us to be in Ghassan Kanafani’s circle 10 minutes before 19:00, the scheduled time in the Facebook event. We expected to be bored while waiting. But as we arrived dozens of young people were already gathering around the circle with Palestinian flags and written slogans. And they just kept coming in…
There was a feeling of unity and strength. Many youth gathered in the center of the circle, posing with the flying flags, one very big with such a long pole to hold it that we were afraid it would hit some electricity cables. Others rotated the circle in a car with the Palestinian flag waving from the window, blowing the car’s horn.
The main block of demonstrators was on one side of the circle, with some youth shouting slogans and the mass answering them with loud voices. There was no need for a megaphone. The slogans were all enthusiastic support for Gaza, its people and its resistance. Old people like me would prefer more political slogans, but nobody would try to calm the Shabab. From time to time they will shout “Sha’abiye, Sha’abiye” – “Popular, Popular”, so you might think they are shouting for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – until they will clear things by ending the slogan: “Hazihi Thawra Sha’abiye” – “This is a popular revolution”.
After some time more people were gathering and it looks like the circle might be closed to traffic. There were few policemen around – I saw three police cars – and three of them came to speak with some of the older people at some distance from the demonstration to warn them… The response was not late to come: A few minutes later the whole mass moved from the circle – not to be dispersed but to start a marching demonstration toward the old city. As we passed near the police, the youth were shouting: “We are not afraid of confrontation” and the police turned their backs.
The demonstration entered the gates of the Akka Wall and moved by Al-Jazzar Mosque into the lanes of the old city. It passed through the market and marched past the fishermen’s port to the Old Khan. Arriving there, we found that the Palestinian flag was waving again at the top of the impressive clock tower.